The Fabricated Fatwa Of the Saudi Cleric: Zionist And Islamophobic Connections

13 January 2013

Assalaamu Alaikum
(Greetings of Peace):

About nine hours ago I
responded to an unfortunate report that was being
disseminated through one of the online groups that I'm
connected with. The report contained the outrageous
claim that a Saudi cleric had issued a "fatwa" that
permitted the rape of Syrian women by the so-calledliberatorsof
Syria. (That alone should have raised a number of red
flags for any thinking person!)

My response was as
follows:

This so-called "fatwa" is
so bizarre, andviolative
of Islam, that I was immediately
interested in checking the source. It should be noted
that on the website where this is found there is also
an editor's note (not
included in the forwarded release) which reads
as follows:

Now whether he issued
this abominable opinion or not, I think it's important
that when we send out such damning information (which
for some legitimizes built in prejudice), we send out allrelevant information.

It now appears, as I
suspected, the fatwa story was a complete fabrication.
For those who are capable of rising above their own
biases or prejudices - esp. where it applies to the
areas of religionandpolitics
- allow me to shed a little light on the
intrinsic nature of a fatwa. In order for a fatwa (a
legal ruling issued by a qualified religious
authority) to be LEGAL, it cannot violate the two
major sources of Islamic jurisprudence:The
Noble Qur'anand
theProphet's
Sunnah(peace
be upon him).

It does not serve the
interests of justice, nor truth, for mediums that are
supposed to be "progressive" to disseminate such
uncorroborated andsalaciously tainted"news
and information." And to my Muslim brethren who are
justifiable critics of some of the shameful teachings
and practices that emanate from "Saudi Arabia," let us
remember the mandate given to us in the Qur'an (via
the following rhetorical question): Do
you call others to fair dealing and forget to practice
it yourselves?

I am personally not a
partisan for either side in the ongoing Syrian
conflict.I
am for the people of Syria, and for the territorial
integrity of that predominantly Muslim nation-
and I don't see either of these interests
represented by either side in this regrettable
conflict.

What's right is right,
and what's wrong is wrong; and the dissemination of
what now appears to have been a fabricated fatwa is
clearly wrong.

A prominent Saudi cleric
has issued a fatwa (a religious ordinance) that calls
for the gang rape of Syrian women. Expressing
frustration that the "warriors of Islam" fighting in
Syria may be getting weary for the lack of sexual
pleasure, the religious leader issued a decree that
promotes hours-long "intercourse marriages."

Al-Arifi is an
ultra-conservative Wahhabi cleric with3.5
million Twitter followersand
more than1.4
million Facebook fans. He has been
prominent in calling Syrians to join the armed
opposition to the government of President Bashar al-Assad
and demanded that other countries intervene militarily
and send weapons to overthrow it.

Al-Arifi has openly
engaged in sectarian incitement against Shia Muslims,
for example in thisvideo
from February 2012, which has more than 1.1
million views.

The claim about the "gang
rape" fatwa should raise immediate red flags. It is
reminiscent of other recent shocking claims about
Muslims that turned out to be libels disseminated by
Islamophobic organizations.

These include a false
story –disseminated
credulously by LGBT magazineThe
Advocate–
that a Muslim cleric had issued a "fatwa" declaring
that sodomy between men was permissible if it was for
the purpose of widing their anuses for the insertion
of explosives to carry out "jihad."

There was also the libel
of a Muslim "rape epidemic" in Norway that The
Electronic Intifadadebunked
a year ago.

A video posted on YouTube
on 1 January shows al-Arifi ridiculing the supposed
fatwa, saying such a thing could never be said by any
"sane person" and warning that he knows of at least
nine social media pages that impersonate him and try
to attribute words to him that he hasn't spoken. He
also said that such falsehoods were disseminated by
stations – which he did not name – whose goal is to
harm the image of Sunni Muslims.

The Twitter denial
includes an image of a fake tweet al-Arifi said was
circulating online, which was an obvious hoax because
it contained far more than 140 characters.

Genealogy of the lurid story

The claim about the
"fatwa" was made on Lebanon's Al-Jadeed channel (New
TV)at
least as early as December 29. Al-Jadeed
does not provide any evidence of the "fatwa" or say
when, where or by what means it was supposedly issued.
As of now, no one has produced any evidence that the
"fatwa" exists, which means that no responsible news
organization should behave as if it does.

News of the "fatwa" was
then disseminated widely on social media in Arabic,
particularly by personas eager to discredit opponents
of the Syrian government.

What is also interesting
is how it traveled through Zionist and American
Islamophobic networks to AlterNet and Salon.

Iran's English-language
Press TV carried a report on the alleged fatwaon
its website. However it is not the Iranian
report that appears to have been the most influential.

Effort to discredit Syrian opposition

On 29 December a Twitter
user called @Eretz_Zen tweeted the New TV video except
now with English subtitles and a logo with the words
"Eretz Zen" obscuring the New TV logo.

Zionist and Islamophobic connections

RadicalIslam.org states
that it is supported by theClarion
Fund, which several years ago distributed
tens of millions of copies of a virulently anti-Muslim
film titledObsession:
Radical Islam's War Against the West.

What's notable is that
the RadicalIslam.org report uses the term "gang rape"
which also appeared later on AlterNet and Salon.com.
The term "gang rape" doesnotappear
in the New TV report.

This is a clue that
perhaps the story traveled from ultra-right-wing
RadicalIslam.org to "progressive" AlterNet without
anyone raising any red flags.

Indian website jumps on the bandwagon

Notably the AlterNet
report links directly to an Indian website calledDaily
Bhaskarthat
also carries the "Eretz Zen" video.

Daily Bhaskarappears
to be a website that habitually reports lurid and
dubiously sourced stories of non-Muslim women being
raped and victimized by Muslims.

Going viral

It's a telling sign of
how deep and common liberal Islamophobia is that even
progressives at AlterNet will believe anything they
hear and not stop to ask a question.

What these repeated
episodes show is that it is easy for many people to
believe negative and shocking information about
unpopular and disreputable figures. When the claims
are lurid – especially involving sex and violence –
they spread more rapidly. And when they fit multiple
agendas – as in this case – there's apparently no
limit to how far they can go.